Am I the only person who thinks Pussy Riot should have been jailed?

Am I really the only person who believes the Russian courts were
right to jail the three members of the punk band Pussy Riot? Am I the
only one who thinks their unauthorised performance of a ‘punk prayer’ at
the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow, was a gross act of
desecration? And am I alone in finding Western hysteria surrounding the
singers’ conviction, a sickening exhibition of moral hypocrisy?

Consider German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s remarks following last
Friday’s sentencing of the three women to two years in prison. She
claimed the ‘excessively harsh’ sentence was ‘not compatible with the
European values of law and democracy’. Good to know that European
‘values’ now include blasphemy and sacrilege.

And what of Irish singer Sinead O’Connor’s comment that ‘these ladies
are showing spiritual leadership in times of great crisis and that is
the job of true artists’? Funny, but I thought the job of a true artist
was to shine a light on the sacred and not to ‘do dirt' on it. And
how, pray tell, is gyrating around the sanctuary of a Cathedral an act
of ‘spiritual leadership’?

What’s more, I don’t remember too many ‘artists’ like Pussy Riot or
Miss O’Connor, using their public platform to denounce the communist
despots of the old Soviet Union. No, back then it was ‘American
tyranny’ they were denouncing. Back then, their heroes were those, like
Chairman Mao, who considered the concentration camp as the only place
worthy of ‘true artists’.

Writing in Monday’s Irish Times, writer and musician Ian Maleney
commented that people like Pussy Riot ‘want the freedom to do, say and
think as they wish, without the undue pressure and influence of the
government. It’s a basic civil right’. No, it is not, for even the
great liberal John Stuart Mill believed that when such freedom ‘harms’
other people, it must be curtailed.

Those who were harmed by Pussy Riot’s antics were not only the
Russian Orthodox worshippers of Christ the Saviour, but, I suspect, most
people who still believe in the sacred. The jailed singers claim they
were entreating the Virgin Mary to save Russia from Vladimir Putin. If
so, why did they think that trampling on sacred soil was a good way to
earn the Blessed Virgin’s favour?

Imagine, for a moment, that rather than invade a Christian church,
Pussy Riot decided to perform their ‘punk prayer’ in a mosque. In such
circumstances, do you think Western politicians, commentators or
‘artists’ would be queuing up to support them? Do you really think the
politically correct High Command would be so vocal in its praise?

We, in the West, have become so immune to attacks on Christianity,
that we can see nothing wrong with a bunch of punks prancing around the
sanctuary of an iconic Cathedral. We defend their sacrilege by invoking
freedom of speech and civil rights. No sympathy, of course, for those
who were deeply offended by their actions, or for the rights of those
who simply wish to worship in peace.

Why aren’t critics of Islam supported with similar zeal? Where are
the ‘true artists’ when brave Muslim women take issue with certain
aspects of their faith? Are they not also showing spiritual leadership
in times of great crisis? As I say, moral hypocrisy.

My own view is that neither a church nor a mosque is a fitting place
to make any form of protest. Both should be respected as places where
the sacred has made its home on earth. It is there, on that holy soil,
that worshippers believe they make direct contact with their Creator.

To use this space for anything other than worship is wanton
desecration. Liberals who have become desensitised to the sacred may
scoff at that suggestion. But for those who still regard certain places
as hallowed, nothing can compensate for even the slightest violation.

Supporter: Singer Sinead O'Connor backed the punk group's protest

The old woman agitated at the sight of children running across the
altar of our local church, was not overreacting. For her, as for me,
that altar represents what T.S. Eliot described as the ‘point of
intersection of the timeless with time’. It is where Christ Himself is
made present and, thus, where the promise of our salvation is fulfilled.

I cannot conceive of people using that sacred altar for political
purposes. I cannot conceive of them squawking and jumping around the
Sanctuary as a way of attracting attention to their cause. That is not
spiritual leadership but, if anything, an assault on the spiritual.

There is nothing wrong with legitimate protest. But no cause,
however great, can morally justify the desecration of holy things, for
that is to wound those whose lives revolve around them. Then again,
perhaps Pussy Riot and their supporters think worshippers at Christ the
Saviour are simply collateral damage.

Sinead O’Connor believes ‘artists are there to push the boundaries’
and that, by ‘using music as a priesthood’, Pussy Riot have ‘made a very
powerful artistic statement’. It is neither powerful nor priestly to
desecrate a church and offend its congregation. In fact, I can’t think
of a softer target.

Let’s hope their prison term will give them space to consider the
difference between truly audacious activism, and that which requires no
courage at all.